All sorts of updates

Books:

Nights of Villjamur - Mark Charan Newton

I was super intrigued by this book. Newton is the same age as me, from Nottingham, pitching out a fantasy debut. He's the me I want to be. Of course, the me I want to be would have finished this book a little better. There's too much telling rather than showing, some character developments which don't really hang true, and the edit is a touch weak. On the plus side the world building has plenty of interesting pieces in it, and there's aliens and non humans a plenty to add to the mix. I'll be getting the next book, because I think there's promise here, but this isn't a debut that stands up against First Law, Name of the Wind or a lot of last year's big splashes. This is a wait for paperback book.

Divided Kingdom - Rupert Thomson

This book is dreadful. Dreadful. The initial premise doesn't hang together at all, doesn't hold up under any scrutiny, doesn't, in fact, make any sense. The main character goes on a journey of personal discovery without making an personal discoveries. This book is, I will be honest, worse than the GI Joe Movie, worse than being waterboarded, worse than that bug which lives inthe Amazon and swims up your piss.

Football

Bye bye Matt Cassell. We hardly knew you. Hello Tyler Thigpen? I heard you were moving to Jacksonville, but that may be off now. Of course, Matt Guttierez may be making an appearance for KC, which is super exciting. It's battle of Tom Brady's backups, redux!

More later